Those that teach can learn from the students they work with, while the learning process as a whole can help overcome cultural differences between the western and eastern worlds.

Dr Mary Catherine Bateson, an American anthropologist and professor emeritus of George Mason University near Washington DC, said that the best teachers are the ones who continually learn from the people they are teaching.

"Teaching and learning go hand in hand," she indicated, before suggesting that each-way respect was a key factor in the learning process.

Her comments, reported by Arab News, came at the Sol Global Forum in Muscat, Oman, where education and business leaders from around the world gathered this week to share their learning experiences and methods of teaching.

In advice to all of those working in education, or with a desire to work in the field, Dr Bateson remarked: "We are not what we know but what we are willing to learn."

The Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics states that watching students develop new skills and begin to appreciate knowledge and learning can be a "rewarding" feature of being a teacher.